updated sam hall with a gallows plaque
read our declaration: a reading of the declaration of independence in defense of equality by danielle allen
slow reading. this too is my patrimony
but i didn't get my answer until i read the declaration of independence with a group of adults struggling to survive
it is not merely those who were alive in 1776 who were members of the candid world: we are too
"unanimity" means "having a single spirit"
to claim the declaration as our own, and to master democratic writing, we first and foremost need to understand that move from principles to facts and then onward to calls for action and, finally, solidarity..solidarity cannot be built without principle
such reluctant revolutionaries were, in adams's words, "all fallen, like grass before the scythe"
i routinely hear from students that the ideals of freedom and equality contradict each other. the declaration argues the opposite case: that equality is the bedrock of freedom
the concluding pledge of mutuality
human events are going somewhere; they have shape and direction; there is meaning to their sequence
the segregationists picked up the language of the declaration and gave it a vicious little twist
"we hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable" give way, as we have seen, to this one: "we hold these truths to be self-evident." this was a profound change..what does self-evident mean exactly? it does not mean that the instant you hear a proposition, you recognize it as true. it means rather that if you look into the proposition, if you entertain it and reflect upon it, you will inevitably come to affirm it
the first three "that's" are all part of a single truth about human beings. then comes a dash, and we start with a second truth about government. then comes another dash, and we get a third and final truth about the right to revolution
the fact that people seek their survival, freedom, and happiness and the fact that people seek to build functioning governments turn out to be equivalent
john locke..in his second treatise of civil government..argued that the experience of judging the actions of abusive political leaders is like being a passenger on a ship with a secret destination
first, there is prudence. people are aware that undoing the whole structure of their lives is a dangerous undertaking, so they are cautious. they hold off until it looks absolutely necessary. they recognize that the seriousness of any revolutionary undertaking requires that the causes be weighty and long-lived. only such causes can justify radical action. then there is habit. people do not easily abolish the forms to which they are accustomed. people invariably get used to things, even things that are damaging to them
we have followed the arc of the declaration from audacious, even sublime, optimism to grinding pessimism. the first two sentences painted us as proactive and self-actualizing, yet the third makes us sound like pack animals - donkeys or dray horses - so cautious and calcified that we willingly carry around heavy loads without making a change
god fave the king
the only practice that secures freedom: the engagement of the relevant parties in practices of responsiveness that permit the ongoing recalibration of relations in order to preserve the equal spheres of agency that each wants
the ninth and tenth sentences of the declaration very carefully define the kind of equality that needs to be in play in relations between people in order for freedom to obtain
the declaration kept parliament's name out of its complaints, even when parliament was involved..keep the focus on king george to turn him singly into a symbol of tyranny
o ! ye unborn inhabitants of america ! should this page escape its destin'd conflagration at year's end, and these alphabetical letters remain legible, - when your eyes behold the sun after he has rolled the seasons round for two or three centuries more, you will know that in anno domini 1758, we dream'd of your times
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